Mission Peak

Hike Review

• I’ve hiked Mission Peak many times in my life, and the place really hasn’t changed much since the last time.

What I Learned

• The Bay Area smog and light pollution were so bad that the view of the comet was worse than it was from my apartment parking lot. Next time I hope to catch a view of another dim celestial object, I’ll go somewhere else.

• I think I need to recharge the car jump battery pack once a year to make sure it is ready to jump the car when I need it.

Friends

• Gene joined me and Cassie. It was fun catching up with Gene during the hike. I missed doing the night hikes with him, so I was glad he could make it out.

What Happened?

6.6 miles, 2 hr 33 mins, 2215 ft of ascent

The day before, I took a picture of C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS), a comet, in the apartment parking lot. I thought if I walked to the top of Mission Peak, maybe the view would be even better! Cassie was happy to return to one of her main haunts, and I thought it’d be great to call in my main night hiking partner, Gene. He was excited too!

We met at the street parking area (since we’d be back far after closing time), and started hiking. We thought maybe we could hike up in an hour, but we ended up taking far longer than that. The hike was beautiful though—the sky was fiery during the sunset, and the street lights lit up the night sky to our detriment. I say detriment because all the bright lights made the comet almost impossible to see with the naked eye and super dim even through our phones. It was a bummer, but at least we got to see the moonrise over Mission Peak.

When we got to the top, we hung around taking pictures and eating snacks until our hands were almost numb with the cold. We then hiked down, trading more laughs and stories until we got back to the car.

I was about to turn left on Mission Blvd when Gene called and told us that he needed a jump. We headed back and attempted to give him a jump with a car jump battery pack, but it was completely empty. So we jumped the car the old-fashioned way. We gave ourselves high fives and headed back home.